Left Alone
by Shadow Sanctuary
Summary: One cell. Two cut wrists. Three deviations from the truth. How far does a patient have to go to be left alone? -Seto Kaiba insanity-


Chapter One: Left Alone

They held me down and threw me into restraints. I was kicking and screaming, slapping staff members with one obscenity after another, refusing to be immobilized by these perverts daring to touch me. Wanna know a secret, though? C'mere, I'll whisper it to you:

_I was thankful they did that to me._

If no one did, I would have bolted out of my cell, busted a window, and leaped into the freedom that thin air promised. Never mind that I live on the sixth floor of this God-forsaken hellhole. It wouldn't have been "attempted suicide", as my sweet, loving doctor claims I am prone to try. It would have been a desperate cry for escape.

I was awake when it happened, scanning _Seventeen _or _Cosmopolitan_ or one of those cheap magazines that turns young girls into sluts. You know what I mean, the kind of material outlining who, what, when, where, and how to fuck a guy right, bringing home the bacon to your honey turning up the heat in your oven. And when the editors aren't giving pointers on losing that so-called, precious virginity, they're encouraging eating disorders with pictures of ridiculously small pants and strappy, bust savvy shirts. Tell me something-once the girl gets Anorexia, how's she supposed to fill out a halter top? Unless breasts the size of mosquito bumps are the new style, all that crash dieting really screws kids up.

One page went by, then two, three, four, five; images of Hollywood heroes, make up and flirtatious get ups flashing before me like billboards on the Las Vegas strip.

_Buy me! _screamed the gaudy clothes and cosmetics, arching over eyes, lips, and hips in a sinful rainbow of colors.

_Date me! _shouted male actors through award-winning smiles, flaunting flawlessly toned muscles, craving the limelight of teen dreams.

_Be like me! _shrieked the model mermaids, showing off luxuriously styled hair, impossibly tiny waists, and large, overdeveloped breasts. 

Ugh. Lord, oh Lord, save me.

Disgusted, I tossed the tramp guide on the floor. The thing belonged in the trash, but I didn't have a can in here. Just a barred window, a mattress, night stand, and one huge freaking pane of glass separating me from a brightly lit hallway. Anytime they wanted, a nurse, therapist, or janitor could peer into my little corner of the world without knocking first. Rude, huh? Not at all! I guess it's great to be surrounded by so many guardian angels in one area, observing as the white-coated pricks flit back and forth in the corridors, tending to one "coping problem" or another. I mean, whatever would I do without someone constantly watching me munch shitty leftovers (meal times are such a blast), get sedated (which fucks me up even more), or take a piss (probably the high point of any of their days)? Be happy? Miserable? Maybe get pissed off and go mad. Heh, heh. That's a good one. According to America the Beautiful, I'm _already _nuttier than squirrel turds, and that's why I'm here. Why else would I be on a maximum security ward, pacing the tiles like a caged animal, waiting to choke down mystery pills in my special paper cups? Because they made a mistake? Because they got me mixed up with someone else?

Bingo.

They might not think so, even call me crazy for "embellishing a delusion" (medical lingo for "insane idiocy"), but it's true. I'm not the person who should be here. They've got the wrong freaking guy. It wasn't me who cut myself up like a Jack O' Lantern, who doused my walls in a brutal blood bath of gore. And it sure the hell wasn't me who smeared on my ceiling in huge, crimson capital letters, _HELP ME_.

It's not me. It never was. It never will be. Quit saying that I did it. Stop writing that I did. Christ, Jesus CHRIST! Why doesn't anyone listen to me? It wasn't me! Goddamnit hell, _it wasn't ME_!

You believe me, right? Right? God, say yes, say yes, say anything but "You're Nuts." I can't take that anymore, people offering me those pathetic faces of sympathy, staring at me with wide, worried eyes like I'm some serial killer out to bring them down with me. Fuck, I don't want to hurt anyone! Do you hear me, you uppity sonsofabitches pitying me? I'M NOT TRYING TO FUCK YOU OVER! Why the hell can't I be left alone? Why am I the schizo, the sicko, the perp, the loony bag, the one who is psychotic enough to torch this place with everyone in it? Listen to me, read my lips, knock this home through your thick head-

Didn't. Do. It. 

Got that? I was set up, framed, played, screwed around, take your pick, I got more, but it's the _truth_. Not _my_ truth, as some loser behavioral scientist would so matter-of-factly say, but _THE_ truth.

The truth that would get me out of this rat bastard building if someone would get off their high horse and pay attention to me.

The truth that, God knows why, has been hidden for too damned long because I'm taking the fall for it and losing it all.

The same truth that will, no doubt, make headlines once it is revealed.

Still don't believe me, do you? Well, that's alright, it's okay. Guess what I'm gonna do anyway?

Prove it to you.

That's right, I'm gonna spend however long I have to-minutes, days weeks months, even whole _freaking _years-just to get my story to sink into that cynical skull of yours. You have to believe me first, though. Trust me, you do. Why? Why should you? Why should _anyone_? This is where the real fun kicks in, with a hook line so morbidly delicious, it'll bury itself in your mouth and reel you in to a fisherman's net, entangling you in a plot you'll never forget. So before we slice logic, drain stability, and gut the senses, here's a little last-minute advice-

Pray.

Find some entity, whatever the hell it is you have faith in, and pray. Drop to your knees, babble in tongues, sell your soul, just do anything you have to do to get your master to lend you some divine intervention. 

What are you asking for, though? 

The answer's as wicked and wet as a butcher's blade, pressing underneath your shiny, delicate scales-

Other fish.

A group of creatures beside you. 

Some sort of life form with you, by you, around you. Near and close and ready to dunk you back in the waters from where you came so you can breathe again. If you stay by yourself in this, thinking science and reason will be your savior, you may end up resisting oxygen to favor the meat market's blade.

You don't want that.

_Nobody _wants that. 

Just like my dear, old friend. He thought he was bold and brave, tough, stronger than any person who crossed his path. Later on, he discovered more than he was simply wrong to have such an inflated ego. He found out why he should have shut his mouth instead of running it to everyone in earshot range. Most importantly, he finally understood some crucial advice received from a roommate a long time ago.

Here, in this very cell, is when the chilling realization hit him. In the shadows of self-torture, cheeks scraping cold granite, his wrists pressing against the ever-hungry corners of the bed's frame, is when the cruel lesson was driven home faster than a sports car heading for innocent kids on a sidewalk. 

_I can't do it…_he whimpers in the blackest part of my brain, hacking my conscience to pieces. _I can't afford this, can't stand it, can't suffer by his hands. Tell me, someone, anyone, why? Why do I have to be here? Why I can't I be in isolation, to be left alone?_


End file.
